Pretty in Peach

So, I can't figure out why blogger is turning the first picture sideways, but if you cock your head to the side, you can see how cute she is! My sister was doing a photo shoot for her generous and talented friends who made these items, and I joined in. Her roommate knit this cute outfit, and a friend we haven't even met stamped the burp cloths. Michaela's Gramps loves baby girls with mohawks, so this one was for him. If you look closely, you can see her natural highlights on the tips. The mohawk hairstyle works great on her since her hair naturally goes straight up in the back (not sure this is going to be so great when she is older!).

Michaela is...

As the photo shows, Michaela is over a month old already! The past few weeks have been extremely busy for us (hence the lack of blogging - sorry!), and Michaela has experienced a lot in her first month of life. She has been to many German towns, several doctors' appointments (for both she and Mommy), the Frankfurt airport, church several times, several restaurants, and many other places downtown and on base. She LOVES bouncing on the exercise ball (being bounced, rather), eating, traveling in the baby bjorn (thanks Dawn!) or sling (thanks Jami!), being outside, and listening to music. She DISLIKES having a wet diaper (especially in the older style cloth) and being tired or hungry. Michaela has also met many, many people in the past month, but her favorites, of course, have been the ones who have come the farthest to meet her...her grandmothers and her auntie. I promise more pictures of some of the events mentioned will be coming soon. I just wanted to post something to hold you over since it has been so long, and she has changed so much already!

First Sunday

Today was Michaela's first Sunday. The newly created family went to church and arrived with the usual tardiness that is a Cookey family trademark. During the service we were waiting for a blood curdling scream to emanate from our little one. We were happy to see that she gave us the visual signals of her hunger before it led to the less desirable verbal signals. After church we headed to Mainz-Kastel in search of flowers for our "window" boxes. She slept contently in her car seat for the entire trip and continued her nap for an hour after we came home. We are hoping these long afternoon naps do not translate to long hours of crying in the night. Currently, she is making the transition to life outside the womb quite well and is a very content baby. We are so blessed. Additionally, we have been blessed by so many friends here in Germany. The generosity includes meals, hand me downs, gifts, a wooden stork, and the list goes on. It has been a humbling experience. To all of you, we give deep thanks.

Hospital website picture

Daddy learned to blog yesterday. We hope you all enjoyed his first post and catch-up of our amazing (and exhausting) week so far. Thank you all for posting comments and warm wishes for our new little girl. Just wanted to post really quickly to let you know that a professional baby pic can be seen on the hospital website at http://www.joho.de. Click on Babygallerie on the lefthand side, and you can view Michaela and many German babies, if you so wish.

Back from the hospital

Here are some of our pictures of Miss Michaela. Mommy spent a total of 17 hours and 49 minutes in labor, but every minute was worth it. Daddy was extremely busy during labor and finished it off by cutting the umbilical cord. Now we have a beautiful, alert, and lovely baby girl. How blessed we are! Thank you God.

A 24 hour old family!

Welcome Miss Michaela Joy!

Mommy couldn't hold back the tears when she saw this.

1 day, 1 month, and 3 months old.

Our postpartum room.

Getting an EKG this morning.

Miss Michaela


Post EKG, everything is normal.


Mommy before the real pain.

Joy oh MICHAELA JOY !!!

Michaela Joy Cookey, born to an exhausted-but-thrilled-set-of-parents at 20:50 on 27 April, 2009 at St. Josef's Hospital. Mommy gutted it out without the epidural, Daddy was "very involved" and Baby Michaela is an inquisitive, alert little beautiful angel. 7 lbs. 2 oz. 20 inches.

Date change

Just wanted to let you know that the date on the last post is wrong...today is Monday, April 27.

Also, I had a contraction in the middle of writing that post and was a bit selfish in my prayer request after experiencing the pain. A healthy baby is all that really matters, so any prayers lifted up for us should be for just that. Thanks again.

P.S. The contractions have slowed a little, so MDC just ran into work to finish something up before we head to the hospital. We'll see what happens....definitely seems like true labor, so I'm not sure why they have slowed.